Video Surveillance
January 10, 2011 |
©iStockphoto.com/Alexey Kuzin
In an industry predicated on leading-edge technology, video surveillance is security’s belle of the ball insofar as sex appeal and innovation are concerned. Combine that with proven, reliable success in security and operational applications alike; reasonable price points and exponential growth; and an upside that’s off the charts. It’s no wonder video has been such a dominant phenomenon the past decade.
Video surveillance, or CCTV as it was referred to then, has captivated security dealers and their customers since VCRs were introduced in the 1970s and then became widespread during the 1980s and 1990s. However, the possibilities, features, applications and interest level began to skyrocket when DVRs hit the market around the turn of the century. The fascination with video has continued unabated with further developments such as IP-based systems, high definition images and sophisticated software.
Given its high visibility and unlimited potential to shape and redefine the marketplace, any assessment of what 2011 holds for the security industry would be remiss without a thorough examination of the latest video surveillance innovations. To find out, SSI interviewed experts from a dozen leading developers and suppliers of video products and solutions. What follows are their insights on exciting technologies such as megapixel cameras, HDcctv, video management systems, video analytics, night vision and many more.
Megapixel Provides More Details
Even casual observers have noticed the significant impact megapixel images and cameras have had on the video surveillance industry. High definition (HD) video (defined as a minimum resolution of 720 to 1,080 pixels) allows for better identification of subjects, requires fewer cameras to cover a given area, provides for specialized applications such as license plate recognition (LPR) and a host of others only now beginning to be realized.
“Once most end users have seen megapixel images, they want megapixel cameras for their system,” says Sara Scroggins, senior product marketing manager for Pelco by Schneider Electric. “That means successful integrators will have to know how to optimize networks for megapixel streams.”
"Factors driving megapixel adoption include new regulations for minimally acceptable quality, frame rate and retention periods," says Pelco's Sara Scroggins. Courtesy Pelco by Schneider Electronics
According to SSI’s latest research, 31 percent of installations involving IP cameras now include megapixel models. However, successful deployment of megapixel cameras requires carefully balancing design elements such as network configuration, bandwidth, compression and frame rates, among other considerations.
“The greatest challenge is how to make these systems easy to install and consistent in their behavior, video quality, network performance, etc.,” says IQinVision President/CEO Pete DeAngelis. “At this point in time, these systems are too close to being ‘one-off’ with too much individual tweaking for every system. Variability in system performance in the form of networking and image quality/encoding requires a good deal of expertise.”
And these challenges are becoming both easier and more complex to deal with as resolutions continue to escalate with larger megapixel images. However, certain advances mitigate some of the aforementioned issues as well as the technology’s history of struggling with dimly lit scenes.
“Some of the most exciting developments are coming in the advancement of wide dynamic range imagers with megapixel resolution,” adds Scroggins. “These developments are being driven by advancement in CMOS imager technology. Historically, CMOS has not performed as well as CCD under low-light conditions.” DeAngelis, agrees, “There has been dramatic improvement in multi-megapixel CMOS sensor technology. We have reached the point where you do not have to sacrifice video quality for resolution anymore.”
HDcctv Allows Analog Upgrades
Although almost the entire high definition discussion in the surveillance realm has revolved around megapixel video, recently an alternative has surfaced. HDcctv is built on technology pioneered for broadcast television. It transmits video uncompressed and without being encapsulated in TCP/IP. HDcctv promises many of the benefits touted by megapixel IP cameras while permitting the use of conventional analog equipment.
“Some installers have stayed away from IP system applications because of the networking and bandwidth issues,” says Pat Lathouris, director of communications for Speco Technologies. “HDcctv now gives installers a high definition alternative to megapixel-quality IP cameras. HDcctv digital cameras deliver high speed digital video over standard coaxial cable and BNC connectors, giving installers a familiar platform.”
Reliance on coax, though, and its ability to typically transmit signals only 100 meters, is at the root of one of two leading challenges HDcctv faces in the marketplace. The other issue is limited product selection. However, according to Shaun Kim, director of CNB Technologies, those matters will soon be resolved.
“HD displays are readily available and HDcctv cameras are being developed by all the major camera manufacturers. Development of HDcctv DVRs has been slow, but that will change in 2011,” he says. “A lot of installed coaxial cables are not adequate for HD. Technologies are under development to maximize the transmission distance over copper cables, and the use of fiber optics is another option.”
Once a wider assortment of equipment becomes available and the cabling restriction is conquered, Kim predicts swift and significant HDcctv adoption across a variety of end customers.
“HDcctv systems will spread throughout the industry rapidly,” he says. “Facilities that demand high security will be the first targets — casinos, airports, power plants, etc. HDcctv can provide real-time high quality video in mission-critical facilities.”
Lenses Critical to Image Quality
With so much attention placed on HD cameras, NVRs, storage capacity and so on, a vital element sometimes lost in the shuffle is the need for precise and high quality optics. Much in the way a sound system is only as good as its speakers, surveillance images are critically reliant on lens choice.
“The clarity of the images is very important and also that of distortion, especially in the case of the wide-angle lenses,” says Chuck Westfall, technical advisor for Canon USA Super Imaging Group. “When I’m talking about clarity, I’m not just talking about the center of the image, but all the way out to the corners. This is something that tends to get overlooked.”
The emergence of megapixel cameras has only served to make any lens shortcomings more glaring than ever before. Yet the overriding quest continues to be both extending the capabilities of the human eye to see farther and a larger field of view, while also trying to replicate the ability to simultaneously focus on subjects in a scene both near and far away. As manufacturers like Canon continue to address these and other optic needs, making end users aware of such challenges helps keep expectations reasonable.
Clearer pictures, higher intelligence, more intuitive interfaces, expanding applications, descending costs — these are just some of many compelling factors propelling video surveillance forward. A dozen top technology providers encapsulate where the market stands for 2011.
"I guarantee that when an end user sees the video quality that can be achieved with megapixel cameras that is what they will want," says IQinVision's Pete DeAngelis. Courtesy IQinVision
As is typical with selecting a security solution, the most important consideration is the particular application. What is the specific need and how can the technology/system be most effectively used to solve it?
“The key point is that they need to be able to match the lens to the assignment they have,” says Westfall. “There are basically two major types of environments to deal with, one being the external environment where you need the power of a lens to be able to zoom in, and the other being a very tight space in an internal area where you need to be able to have wide-angle coverage to see as much as possible.”
VMS Makes Systems Easier to Use
As video surveillance systems have migrated to enterprise networks, become more sophisticated, expanded in scale and complexity, and more frequently integrated with other systems such as access control and intrusion, the need for a unified user interface has become paramount. These trends have led to the emergence of video management systems or software (VMS) and the open or nonproprietary platforms to facilitate interoperability.
“Capabilities of video management systems continue to expand, many of them driven by the benefits of open architecture,” says Gadi Piran, president of OnSSI. “Collaboration with third-party vendors helps to extend the core benefits and functionality of video management software to include cutting-edge technologies such as video analytics, and to expand networks using wireless mesh and broadband networks to enable viewing of live video anywhere from a mobile device.”
End users find VMS appealing because it simplifies using and interacting with the video surveillance system. In addition, many are discovering the wealth of operational efficiencies beyond traditional surveillance or security that can be gained by allowing the VMS to facilitate overall enterprise management tasks.
“Video systems can provide a new and effective management tool useful throughout modern companies,” says Piran. “Video can be easily made available from anywhere the corporate network extends. Video can help with process control, personnel management, inventory tracking, quality control, customer service and a range of other uses.”
More specifically, VMS-based solutions play especially well into several vertical markets. These include education, government, health care, transportation and homeland security.
“Real-time video coupled with the reach of corporate networking are a powerful combination for a diverse range of organizations that are only now beginning to understand and embrace these expanded benefits,” says Piran. “This exciting, untapped potential also relates to another challenge in the enterprise environment, which is the need to show a return on investment [ROI] for any technology purchase.”
Edge Devices Cut Network Load
One of the most substantial wrinkles since IP-based video came into vogue has been moving away from centralized system architectures toward so-called “edge” devices, especially the cameras. Where cameras had been little more than image conduits networked to NVRs or DVRs, decentralized topologies include intelligent cameras with built-in features like recording, storage, analytics and more.
“IP cameras are kind of an integration of the camera itself plus analog video encoders. In one piece of equipment, you have both the video, the camera itself and the video compression board,” says Guy Shahmoon, a product manager for Verint. “The devices are becoming smarter. With the storage and analytics on the edge they are really starting to become almost self-contained devices.”
Sending less data less often from camera locations fulfills the objective of avoiding bandwidth constraints and overburdening the network. However, as Shahmoom points out, there are numerous other advantages to edge devices, including a secondary reason for decentralized storage.
“Not only can edge devices compress the video and send it over the network, but in cases where the link is broken for different reasons, they will start to record the video locally. This is a very powerful solution,” he says. “In addition, being IT-friendly provides easy maintenance for these devices. Another plus is lower power consumption, meaning edge devices are more ‘green’ and environmentally friendly.”
Edge devices place an incumbent challenge on integrators to convince clients that the typically higher cost for the equipment can be offset by long-term gains. Another hurdle is that the complexity of the hardware and software can make it difficult to integrate the devices such that all features and advantages can be fully realized. Two organizations — ONVIF and PSIA — have been established to contend with this issue.
“We’re still not there with the ONVIF/PSIA protocol,” says Shahmoom. “It’s kind of on the side where usually the protocol that is being used to integrate the edge device to the VMS is still the proprietary one from each manufacturer. But this will evolve. In the future, we will definitely see more edge device manufacturers supporting ONVIF and PSIA. This will eventually help and ease the integration, and should make it more reliable and seamless.”
Storage Solutions Maintain Data
Early on in the introduction of digital video and later networked video, where and how to store all that data presented numerous challenges. The capacity of hard drives was limited with the largest ones being very expensive. There were also the issues of failure rates and backup or redundancy. Today, capacity has risen dramatically to keep pace with increasing storage demands while prices have continued to plummet.
“Appliances delivering integrated IP- storage area network [SAN] technology are now a mature part of the physical security market,” says Jeff Whitney, vice president of marketing for Intransa. “Appliances, properly executed, can simplify the effort and reduce the cost of installation and ongoing operation of a physical security solution, while improving overall system performance.”
One of the key developments in the area of storage has been the introduction of solutions specifically designed and engineered for the functionality and rigors of video surveillance. Much trial and tribulation transpired attempting to use devices intended for computing or other purposes rather than security. Today’s storage appliances aim to cover many bases.
“The best appliances are designed to offer the simplicity of a DVR, eliminating hundreds of potential commodity server and storage choices, and optimized specifically for physical security requirements,” says Whitney. “Appliances continue to grow in power and can simultaneously support other applications like access control and video analytics on a single platform. That further reduces complexity and cost.”
In many projects, storage can represent as much as half the cost of a video surveillance system, which means it is also where an integrator can save their customers the most and/or realize the highest margin. As Whitney describes, there are a host of other benefits to be had with storage appliances as well.
“Eliminating the bench time needed to integrate servers, storage, components, operating systems and application software into a single, functioning platform with an appliance, integrators are able to reduce their installation costs and chose whether to pass on some or all the savings to their customers,” he says. “Appliance solutions are also able to be easily upgraded, plugging in additional capacity without halting operations.”
Clearer pictures, higher intelligence, more intuitive interfaces, expanding applications, descending costs — these are just some of many compelling factors propelling video surveillance forward. A dozen top technology providers encapsulate where the market stands for 2011.
As the number of cameras and surveillance systems continues to grow and proliferate at an unprecedented pace, it is becoming more apparent that steps must be taken to better organize, analyze and evaluate all the captured video data. Humans are ill-equipped to monitor so much information on their own. Fortunately, programmers have been busy creating advanced algorithms to make sense of all this video “noise” in the form of video analytics.
“Video analytics is a form of machine vision or computer vision that evolved from being able to look at or pick out objects and still images to the ability to do it with video that is rapidly moving images going through the machine,” says Craig Chambers, CEO of Cernium. “We tend to think of video analytics as higher end functionality that really allows you to do a full assessment of what the objects are in a scene and what they’re up to.”
The prospect of and potential of video analytics has captured the imagination of the security industry and general populace alike. However, it’s only very recently that the technology has been refined to where the performance is approaching the hype. This is now hastening its widespread dissemination and usage.
“Within just a year or two, you’ll see it in pretty much every DVR and most IP cameras that are on the market,” adds Chambers. “The technology has really gotten a lot more sophisticated and diverse now. It’s everything from line crossing, and in some cases facial recognition, to object classification.”
The ability to deliver facial recognition performance, something that had traditionally been an expensive proposition with limited application and accuracy, is particularly noteworthy. Bill Taylor, president of Panasonic System Networks Co. of America, is among those enamored with this breakthrough. “New NVRs on the market today have embedded face matching capability that eliminates the use and added expense of external software,” he says. “In real-time they match registered face images with a face displayed on a live camera feed. When a match occurs, alarm notification is sent.”
Video analytics offers several benefits beyond making life easier for security personnel, or increasingly making some of them expendable altogether. Many of these are powerful selling points as they deliver end users a compelling return on the investment.
“In terms of being able to provide capabilities that couldn’t be provided before to their customers, everyone should be interested,” says Chambers. “For instance, you can radically reduce the amount of storage necessary to keep relevant video since all the unimportant information is filtered out. Plus you can direct only relevant information to people through the network to mobile phones, PCs or wherever they happen to be.”
Taylor cites some specific types of prospects likely to show keen interest in the virtues of analytics. “There are many niche applications that will add further revenue generation possibilities for integrators and dealers,” he says. “Examples include the banking and financial markets for identity verification, retail and supermarkets to alert of suspected/known shoplifters, and corporate facilities for visitor management applications and notification of restricted personnel.”
Night Vision Not Afraid of Dark
The military has long used technologies such as thermal and infrared (IR) imaging to be able to pick up people or objects in the dark. These devices or systems were quite sophisticated and were generally steeply priced, which made them cost prohibitive for most civilian security applications.
"If you’re protecting a critical asset, you don’t get the day off because it’s dark out or happens to be foggy. The security system still needs to function just as well as it did when it was bright and sunny outside. That’s the message that thermal delivers," says FLIR's Andy Teich. Courtesy FLIR
Everything radiates some level of heat and thermal imaging captures those signatures regardless of day or night conditions. One of the features that makes thermal so unique is its ability to not only render surveillance footage in total darkness but also the fact that it overcomes visual obstructions.
“Thermal cameras offer true 24/7 capability,” says Teich. “The ancillary factors are, not only can you see at night, but if somebody were to set off a smoke bomb or if there was a fire, you could see through the smoke just perfectly. You can also see through other light obscurances such as fog, snow and rain.”
Night vision-capable cameras lend themselves to a diverse and unique range of surveillance applications that are only being scratched by the security industry. As the prices continue to drop, this figures to be an area of significant growth for enterprising providers.
“This is a very exciting time because the technology has really been catching on in the security sector the past 18 months or so,” says Teich. “If you’re up on emergent technologies like thermal imaging and [FLIR’s proprietary] color night vision, and you bring that as a solution to your customers, you now have a differentiated offering that can solve problems other integrators likely can’t.”
Video Verification Validates Alarms
While the bulk of video surveillance innovations relate to networked systems, there is another area with perhaps even greater immediacy for most providers — particularly alarm dealers and monitoring firms. That is video verification of intrusion alarms. Technology is now available to help dealers minimize false police dispatches.
“Cordless, wireless video alarms — I’ll call them standalone video alarm systems, or even standalone video intrusion alarms — are becoming increasingly valuable because law enforcement is giving higher priority response to alarms that are verified because they are treating them like a crime in progress,” says Keith Jentoft, president of RSI-Videofied. “These systems are inexpensive; they compete with a standard system.”
There is an increasing body of deployments of this technology that has not only decreased false alarms but also helped put more perpetrators behind bars. Suitable for indoors or outdoors, this particular solution combines a compact camera and a PIR motion sensor so when activity is detected, surveillance footage is captured.
“When an intruder trips it, the PIR is the switch for the camera and it takes a 10-second video clip of what caused the alarm,” says Jentoft. “The alarm and video clip of what caused it are sent to the central station over the cell network, so the monitoring person can see why they had an alarm and dispatch differently. What happens is you have a virtual eyewitness to a crime in progress, so of course, cops come faster.”
With the price point dropping in the past 18 months to where this video verification is now applicable to residential as well as commercial/industrial customers, Jentoft sees a great opportunity for dealers.
“I would look at upselling verification to your existing customers,” he says. “We have an upgrade kit that you can provide both video and a cell upgrade to an existing system. So as people are getting rid of their phone lines, the dealers are having attrition issues because if you get rid of your phone lines, your system doesn’t work. Now you can get rid of your phone line and upgrade your system to video with cell backup using the cell network.”
